Overview of Analytics Industry in India (my notes and views)

and it comes in various shapes and sizes. From the curious ones asking finer details about the industry, the optimists confirming that data science would be the fastest growing field in the next decade to pessimists asking whether data scientists would even be required 5 years from now?

To be honest, I myself don’t know answers to a lot of these questions (and that is the reason it is exciting to be working in this domain!) and at times I discuss these questions with various thought leaders in industry. But, I do have my views on these questions. These views are mostly based on my work experience and interaction with people in industry across the globe over last 9 years.

Since I get these questions very frequently, I hope that a lot of people would be interested in knowing these views. Hence, I thought I would share my notes and views on the industry through this article. I hope this helps those thousands of people trying to answer these questions for making their own decisions.

Overview of Analytics / Data Science industry:

Before we proceed any further, let us understand the setup of analytics industry today. This section becomes the basis for the rest of the article, so you should put close attention to this section.

Data Science industry is best understood through following diagram:

As you can see, the industry can be looked as a summation of three different verticals – Data Science products, the in house analytics happening in various companies and the third party services / consultancy provided by companies. Among the three, it is very difficult to size the in house analytics setup. How do you put a value to the contribution of data science in the products and services provided by Google?

Hence, whenever you hear any metric related to size of data science industry, it would mostly be focused on either products or services. Also, there are a few additional industries associated with data science which are not covered in this framework. These would include data science training institutes, placement agencies and even Analytics Vidhya! We will touch upon these associated industries later in the article.

How big is analytics industry and how fast is it growing?

Size of analytics services market:

According to Avendus Capital (in 2012), the data analytics market in India is expected to reach $1.15 billion by 2015, and will account for a fifth of India’s knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) market of $5.6 billion. Further, as per recent report published by NASSCOM (2014), this is further expected to double up and become $2.3 billion by 2017-18. Bulk of this revenue would be driven by the top companies like Mu-Sigma, Fractal, AbsolutData, LatentView etc.

According to a research from Everest Group, the size of global analytics services is between $2 – 2.5 billion in 2013. This essentially means that India holds 35% – 50% of global analytics services market.

The Analytics Products market:

If you thought, the numbers quoted above were big, there are bigger numbers coming ahead. And if you thought that the numbers above were not so big, continue reading. The global Data Science / analytics marketplace today stands at $100 billion and is growing at 30% year on year.

So, the services industry mentioned above is actually a small portion in overall scheme of things. However, for some reason the focus of data science industry in India has been services and not products – possibly because of presence of the employers.

Which sectors are using / benefiting from analytics?

In terms of penetration, different sectors have seen different penetration and adaption of analytics. Here is the distribution of services revenues (globally) by various sectors from the study done by Everest research in 2013.

As you can see, the sectors with highest revenues are CPG & Retail, BFSI, Telecom and Healthcare. Similar trend holds true for India as well. I would think that BFSI & telecom would be a larger share in India as opposed to global revenues based on my interaction with people in industry, but that is a view.

For more details, people can look at the list of companies using analytics in India here.

What about jobs? Are analytics jobs increasing by the day?

I am sure you have heard the headline here. The famous McKinsey report quotes a shortfall of up to 190,000 data scientists and 1.5 Mn data managers in the U.S. alone. The shortage obviously increases when you look at the situation across the globe. Let us add more texture to this.

Here is what Google Trends speaks about searches related to analytics jobs across the globe:

While the global trend is quite evident and India is the most significant area in the heatmap of Google searches, the trend in India looks to have lot more noise. Here is how it looks specifically for India:

Looking at regional searches with in India, Gurgaon & Bengaluru seem to have the highest search for analytics jobs, while Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Chennai seem to have most searches for Big Data jobs. This is also in sync with our experience with jobs in industry. As per our estimate, Bengaluru would have 30 – 40% jobs market share, Delhi NCR would have 25 – 30% market share and then the remaining cities. Here is a heat map of the same:

Rise of Analytics Startups globally & in India

This is probably one of the most exciting times to be in a startup, more so for a data science startup. In general, people are more open to taking risk than ever before. Big Data and Data Science projects have received a very favorable response from the venture capital. Today data science is directly or indirectly impacting every major start-up. A while back, we also saw an increase in data science based start-ups in Y Combinator.

Just for context, here is a list of top 10 most funded analytics / Big Data startups in Jan 2015 (source: Gill Press on Forbes):

Data Science start-ups in India

Until few years back, analytics market in India was primarily being driven by Blue Chip companies and Consulting Firms. But, the situations has started to change now. The ferocious wave of startups striking every possible industry, also entered the analytics market.

While it may be too early to comment on success / failure of these startups right now, what I like is the fact that some of these start-ups are aimed towards creating products rather than the services market. For example, Gramener is creating a software for visualizing data. Here is a list of some exciting startups in India. As would be evident from the list above, Opera Solutions and Mu Sigma would be the most funded start-ups from India.

The analytics training market in India

As mentioned in the overview section, this does not fall directly under data science industry, but is closely associated with the industry. Hence, I thought I would add some details on this as well. Lately, there has been an explosion in number of institutes (both recognized and new) offering data science trainings / courses in India. On one side, there are likes of ISB, Great Lakes, Praxis and IIMs offering several executive programs and on the other hand, there are several players providing short term certifications. I think the size of analytics training industry would be close to ~100 Crores p.a. and is increasing at approximately 20% p.a.

While there has been an increase in the number of offerings to create industry professionals, till now the industry has not been very open to these candidates. Among the ones who undergo these trainings, only a few get placed in analytics roles with in 3-6 months of finishing the training.

So, there is a kind of imbalance in industry today, where on one hand there are trained people wanting to enter the industry and on the other hand companies are not able to find talent for the open positions they have.

So, there is a kind of imbalance in industry today, where on one hand there are trained people wanting to enter the industry and on the other hand companies are not able to find talent for the open positions they have. Normal cycle for filling up an analytics position in industry stands at staggering 6 – 12 months. And the more senior position you are looking for, the more difficult it is go get good people. Over time, I expect this gap to narrow, but there is clear need of improvement here.

A few other trends in analytics industry in India:

While Bengaluru & Delhi NCR have traditionally been the hub of analytics in India, there are new cities like Pune, Hyderabad and Chennai coming up fast on the heat map.

In terms of tools, SAS would still dominate the market share as most of the banks, telecom players and CPG players rely on SAS. However, the start-ups and consultancies have clearly started focusing on R and Python. So, this might be up for a change, especially given the trend in the U.S.

Currently, there are only a limited set of companies working on real Big Data analytics problem. While Big Data has generated a lot of buzz, most of the job openings today are focused towards developers as opposed to analysts.

The industry is going through really tough competition in recruiting the top talent directly from colleges. This has resulted in a very healthy increase in pay packages to the best talent from premier institutes.

In coming times, I expect a lot of action in analytics in the heated e-commerce space in the country. With the likes of Flipkart and Snapdeal setting up their own analytics units and Amazon being Amazon, data assets are expected to create a differentiation in coming times.

End Notes

This article is meant to provide an overview on the current situation of analytics industry in India. Please note that some of the information mentioned above are my views based on my interaction with people. It may or may not be wrong. If you have spent a few years in industry in India or outside, I would love to hear your take on these subjects (and otherwise). If you can share your views and notes through the comments below, I would love to hear them and people reading this would benefit tremendously.

Kunal is a post graduate from IIT Bombay in Aerospace Engineering. He has spent more than 10 years in field of Data Science. His work experience ranges from mature markets like UK to a developing market like India. During this period he has lead teams of various sizes and has worked on various tools like SAS, SPSS, Qlikview, R, Python and Matlab.

30 Comments

I’m a complete nubile in analytics. I am hoping to land up in a role more about analytics than about development.
Recently I got admitted to great lakes, and now I’m trying for ISB. My previous experience has been in Storage (handling SAN,NAS boxes from companies such as EMC, IBM, Sun, etc), my own startup and currently an NGO.
After reading that, first off, the training scenario is not good, and second, that there less jobs for business analyst than for a developer, I’m doubtful I’ll land my in my dream job.

Let me clarify what I mean by the imbalance. You should not expect a job just because you have undergone a training. However, if you put in continuous efforts and are motivated, there are enough successful stories of transition, especially from IT industry.

For the jobs market, as mentioned in the section related to jobs, there are enough jobs in the analytics space and usually companies find it hard to fill these positions. The relatively less number of jobs are on Big Data Analytics – which is a different skill set.

You should be clear whether you want to get into analytics or big data and then take the inferences mentioned above accordingly.

But you mentioned Big Data certification course in Jigsaw academy as the top course in your training institute list. Do you think it is hard to find a job after this course? Please help me. I’m a fresher with BTech in Computer Science. And I’m planing to take this course. So it would be great if you could help me to solve this doubt.

Yes, the course is one of the best courses available today. But that does not necessarily mean you will get a job for sure. If you are planning to undergo the course and focus only on learning during this period (as in you are not doing this along with your job), you should make sure that you spend good time working on projects and developing a portfolio by the time you finish your course.

Suppose a person completes a course from a reputed institute (think ISB, IIM, great lakes) and is highly motivated to do his part of homework (apart from the course) in analytics. What do you think are the chances of landing him in a job? What could be the standard salary?

I know there is no one fit answer and circumstances vary. I just want to know a general idea.

Also, could you point out to a blog, if any, in which I could understand different roles in analytics field?
I’m basically more keen towards the business side of it rather than the development side of it.

“While there has been an increase in the number of offerings to create industry professionals, till now the industry has not been very open to these candidates. Among the ones who undergo these trainings, only a few get placed in analytics roles with in 3-6 months of finishing the training.”

Is that true? I was thinking about taking a Big Data course. But now I’m confused about it. How good is Jigsawacademy certificate?

I think the offering is one of the better ones among whatever is currently available in industry. You will need to put in efforts along with the course to make sure you have a portfolio of projects to showcase. Whether you get a job or not also depends on your background and past experience outside the course.

Also, I should mention clearly that this is by no means a discouragement for people looking to transition in analytics / big data. There are quite a few success stories from people who have put in regular efforts outside the course.

1) On the above article, How do we segregate Business Analyst and Data Scientist. There are various certification programs provided by SAS institutes such as BA using regression, Predictive Modelling using Enterprise Miner. Does SAS Enterprise-Miner Certification fall under Business Analyst or Data Scientist ? Can you please associate the type of courses you have associated with BA & Data Scientist in the article. It will be really helpful for us in choosing the certification when we go for training. All we get is a handout from SAS telling us what they teach.

2) Can you please throw some light on associating the practical Analytics jobs, their requirement and certifications provided by SAS ?

3) I also assume, as suggested in the above article, doing certifications will not let us end up in Analytics jobs, i assume to do a transition in profiles, we need to beef up domain knowledge, say banking … so how and where do we start with to gain domain knowledge which will help us post certification programs.

Your reply would be really helpful in quick starting preparation for the analytics world

3. While domain knowledge can help, it is not the primary reason why transition takes time or is difficult. The main reason is usually the fact that until you practice a few problems end to end, there is a gap in knowledge you have vs. what is required on the job. Hence, you should work on as many problems in hands on manner as possible.

Thanks Kunal for Sharing the Thoughts…Really nice info…
I am a part of the PGPBA Batch 6 of Great Lakes, and It was indeed a Great Session what you took yesterday at Gurgaon. This Website is indeed a treasure for people like us who struggles to get some authentic information on Analytics over the internet.

Hi Kunal,
Very informative article. I totally agree to your views of having a gap between trained analytics talent wanted to join industry and industry looking for the talented and experienced people in analytics. I experienced it. It was eye opener for me when I completed my 1 year Business Analytics course and eagerly looking for opportunities. I think, only analytics course is not sufficient to enter the area, hands on in data analytics are equally important . The industry also need to be mature to provide opportunities to such talents apart from highly experienced data scientist.

Kunal – I have been in Product Management/BA roles but would like to add Data Science my know how. My goal is not to become a data scientist and do in house analytics but to get enough knowledge to apply that science for work or be able to play a BA role for products in this space. What would you suggest to some one like me?

i am having 4 years pf exp in Java product development. Right now i am confuse about my career shift.
I am having 2 offers , one in Big data and another one in java. And both companies are very good. But company with Big Data profile is offering me 2 lacs less salary compare to JAVA company. I am not much aware about big data. I have just basic idea. But one thing i know i can learn anything. They hired me on the basis of java/algorithm skills.

What should i do now? Which path should i choose? If i opt for Big data then i can compensate 2 lacs loss in a near future?

“So, there is a kind of imbalance in industry today, where on one hand there are trained people wanting to enter the industry and on the other hand companies are not able to find talent for the open positions they have. Normal cycle for filling up an analytics position in industry stands at staggering 6 – 12 months”

Can you please explain on what are the kind of gaps leading to this disparity between what the market wants and what leading institutions today offer (specifically talking about the executive programs offered by likes of ISB, IIM, Great Lakes etc.), what exactly are factors fuelling the gap and how in your opinion can it be narrowed down?

I want clarify my doubts, such as is there any particular course content for business analytics, i want to become an expert in business analytics field, for this what courses and certifications are required.
Please inform me…………

I have 3 years of work experience(at a MNC) in Business Intelligence and worked on BI tools such as Informatica, Cognos and Data Stage in different projects in telecom domain. At present I am pursuing a one year MBA course at a new b school.I am looking for a managerial role in Data Analytics in future. There is no specialization for Business Analytics here. What specialization do you think would be better for my profile out of Marketing,Finance and operations.Do you suggest me to learn any other courses such as Hadoop/R/Qlickview to add to my profile ?

“According to a research from Everest Group, the size of global analytics services is between $2 – 2.5 billion in 2013. This essentially means that India holds 35% – 50% of global analytics services market.”

Are you sure about this Kunal? The Nasscom report pegs the global analytics services market to be at USD 54Bn and the global products market to be at USD 42Bn. (i.e. totalling to USD 96Bn)

i would like to understand, Analytics is all about data modeling ( using various tools and models like Decision tree, regression using R, SAS etc.) or a reporting guy working on various reports, dashboard for the operations & management with call outs and trend analysis will also be considered as Analytics professional. is there any differentiation between Analytics & Reporting person? As per my understanding most of the time Reporting is required than developing any model using data. i am bit confused on this and looking for your advise here.
i have 10 years of experiences in reporting and analysis but do not know any of the data modeling concept, is it really required fro me to grow in Analytics world.

i would like to understand, Analytics is all about data modeling ( using various tools and models like Decision tree, regression using R, SAS etc.) or a reporting guy working on various reports, dashboard for the operations & management with call outs and trend analysis will also be considered as Analytics professional. is there any differentiation between Analytics & Reporting person? As per my understanding most of the time Reporting is required than developing any model using data. i am bit confused on this and looking for your advice here.
i have 10 years of experiences in reporting and analysis but do not know any of the data modeling concept, is it really required for me to grow in Analytics world.

i would like to understand, Analytics is all about data modeling ( using various tools and models like Decision tree, regression using R, SAS etc.) or a reporting guy working on various reports, dashboard for the operations & management with call outs and trend analysis will also be considered as Analytics professional. is there any differentiation between Analytics & Reporting person? As per my understanding most of the time Reporting is required than developing any model using data. i am bit confused on this and looking for your advice here.
i have 10 years of experiences in reporting and analysis but do not know any of the data modeling concept, is it really required for me to grow in Analytics world.

Hello Kunal Sir,
Good evening,
I want to say Thanks for Sharing the Thought, This is Really nice article…
I am Kanu chakraborty, I am from Agartala, Tripura. presently I am Student of MSLIS from ISI,DRTC, Bangalore. I am Interest to know about data mining, Big data analytic. Please inform me if there is any such kind of workshop.
Thank you
Best regards
Kanu Chakraborty
E-mail – [email protected]

Thanks for this great article.
I am a graduate from IIT , KGP and I am planning to change my career domain into data science. I have some knowledge in SQL, Excel, R, STATA and currently trying to learn Machine learning , Python and Octave from coursera.
It would be of great help if you could let me know how should I proceed. Though it has been 5 years since I graduated and have been working under different profiles like software developer, Quality assurance, Business Analyst. While working under these profiles, I really got interested in data science and analysis while working on a project. And I would really really like to pursue my career in data science.
Could you please help me proceed in this direction.

Secondly, i would like ask a question that how easy and difficult to get a job in data science would be given I have worked in different domains and hardly have any work experience (expect a few months project) in this filed. How much proficiency should I gain to get a decent entry.
Will be waiting for your reply.